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History:
Helicopters | UAVs | Compound | Geeps | Heavy Lift | Future | Piasecki first
Piasecki's History
In 1986 President Ronald Reagan awarded Frank
Piasecki with
the National Medal of Technology for the development of
the tandem
rotor helicopter (Flying Banana), the compound aircraft (an innovative
VTOL design), and other contributions to vertical aircraft, as well as
creation of what has become the Boeing Vertol Company with
annual sales over $500 million and over 6,000 employees.
THE BEGINNING OF VERTICAL LIFT
World War I, and the interest in the airplane
as a weapon, delayed the early helicopter’s development. After the war, the
"autogyro" was invented by De la Cierva (Spain). Pitcairn (USA), Kellett (USA),
the autogyro company of Great Britain, and Focke (Germany) all produced variations of this
aircraft. Its unpowered, wind-turned rotor made the autogyro capable of slow flight, free
of stalling, but without the capability of hovering.
The helicopter, with a powered rotor, promised
hovering but had greater technical problems. These early machines were not developed to
the point of practical use. Many experts, including the Wright brothers, deemed the
helicopter too complicated. Despite the skepticism usually met by any new idea, a handful
of designers were determined to make VTOL (Vertical Take-Off or Landing) technology work.
Breguet successfully flew his second helicopter
(two co-axial rotors) over a 9 km. Closed course. De Bothezat’s (Russia/USA) four
rotor helicopter flew in 1922, but the pilot declared it deficient in control. Berliner,
Hafner, Young, Wilford, Daland, Lepage, and others developed various methods of
controlling VTOL. In 1939 Igor Sikorsky flew his VS-300, the first successful helicopter
in the United States.
In 1936, Frank N. Piasecki and a group of
engineering students from the University of Pennsylvania formed the P-V Engineering Forum
to design and build their own helicopter. The story of the resulting projects and
achievements follows.
THE PIASECKI STORY OF VERTICAL LIFT
Vertical air lift began in 1783 with a
hot air balloon made by the Montgolfier Brothers of France. One hundred and twenty years
later at Kitty Hawk, N.C., the Wright Brothers flew the first successful powered airplane.
Four years later, Louis Breguet of Paris built the first helicopter to lift a man. The
growth of aeronautical technology gave birth to a major industry responsible for many
world wide social, political, and economic changes.
The following pages show the story of the
efforts and accomplishments of the Piasecki team in vertical air lift technology. Shown
are the aircraft they designed, developed, produced, and successfully flew over fifty five
years of innovation and evolution.
The achievements which mark Piasecki vertical
lift aircraft designs, and some visions of the future, are presented for the interest of
those whose opinions are valued, and as a tribute to those who made these accomplishments
possible.
F.N. Piasecki
PV-2 TENTH ANNIVERSARY - 1953 - MORTON, PA
KEN MEENEN, ELLIOT DALAND, FRANK N. PIASECKI, DON
MEYERS, FRANK MAMROL, WALT SWARTZ
THE NEW COMPANY
In the mid 1950's, Piasecki Helicopter
Corporation had a greater backlog than all other helicopter companies in the free world
combined. Because of the rapid success of the company, and the need for large capital
inputs, many mergers were considered and investigated. Finally, the company was sold to
the Boeing Airplane Company.
In 1955, Frank Piasecki and members of his
original team left Piasecki
Helicopter Corporation and started Piasecki Aircraft Corporation (PiAC) to work on new
VTOL aircraft concepts.
PiAC’s design philosophy concentrated on
advanced VTOL aircraft configurations, continuing the exploratory work that previously had
been done throughout earlier helicopter development. Heavier lift and higher speeds were
the two major performance goals.
Initially, heavy lift VTOL studies were
performed for the army including the movement of a 50 ton tank externally, a matrix of
rotor/propulsion systems studies showed multiple shaft driven rotors were the optimum
heavy lift configuration for the near-term and a blade mounted turbo-jet system (PA-1) for
the long term. The high development cost of the latter unfortunately dissuaded any further
research effort.
By the mid 1950's, higher speeds were of
growing interest to the USMC for forward battle areas. A design study, wind tunnel tests,
and full scale component tests were made for the bureau of aeronautics for a VTOL
configuration utilizing a vectored flow ducted propeller in which the duct was of
sufficient chord to provide the required wing area. A large instrumented test stand was
built with a 1,200 hp piston engine for ducted propeller research.
The ensuing efforts and their results are shown
in the following pages.
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